


Drowning in Your Love (My Flatmates Keep Drowning Each Other in the Kitchen Sink)

by lovetincture



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Asphyxiation, Breathplay, Consent is Sexy, Edgeplay, Fluff, Fluff and Smut, It's more sweet than dark really, M/M, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Shameless Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-26
Updated: 2018-11-26
Packaged: 2019-08-29 23:52:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16753861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovetincture/pseuds/lovetincture
Summary: So that was how John Watson found himself standing awkwardly in the kitchen, steeling himself to drown his flatmate.Sherlock asks John to drown him in the kitchen sink for an experiment. John likes it. Sherlock asks to drown John in the kitchen sink, and John likes that even more.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, y’all. This particular fic was inspired by a r/legaladvice post on reddit called “My Roommates Keep Drowning Each Other in Our Kitchen Sink.” Apparently I can’t read that and keep my mind out of the gutter.

“John, I need you to drown me.”

“Right,” said John, flicking to a new page in the newspaper. “Not doing that.”

“John, it’s for a _case_ ,” Sherlock protested, as though that made all the difference and would suddenly turn his refusal into doing what Sherlock wanted.

John considered. In fairness, he did usually do what Sherlock wanted.

“I’m not drowning you,” he said slowly. “What do you need that for, anyway? Can’t you just—”he gestured vaguely with one hand. “I don’t know, Google it, or something? And anyway, drowning is pretty obvious, isn’t it? Water in the lungs, bluing around the mouth, signs of asphyxiation,” he rattled off the signs he’d learned in medical school. “Should be pretty easy to prove the victim drowned, no?”

“No,” Sherlock breathed, and there was that curious, mad light in his eyes. “Not the _victim_ , John. The victim didn’t drown, the killer did.”

“Sorry? I’m not following.”

“One Elizabeth Madderson succeeded in killing her boyfriend via blunt force trauma to the head. She claims in self-defense.”

“Because he was drowning her,” John clarified.

“Yes, that’s what I said, isn’t it? Don’t repeat things. She has bruising on her arms and throat consistent with a struggle, but I don’t know if it’s even possible to fight off an assailant as you’re being drowned in a bathtub.”

“So you want me to drown you in the bathtub,” John deadpanned.

“Well, I wanted to drown _you_ in the bathtub. You’re smaller and have less reach, so I thought it would be a more apt demonstration, but I thought it likely you wouldn’t agree, so yes I thought you could drown me instead.”

“Oy, I was a soldier,” John said, momentarily goaded into participating in this ridiculous conversation as though which of them should drown the other was a simple matter of flatshare logistics, like whose turn it was to fetch the milk (Sherlock. Always Sherlock, because John _always_ fetched the milk.)

“Indeed,” Sherlock said. “Which is why I think it will still work. You’re smaller but presumably you have more training and will be able to pin me effectively.”

“Right,” John said, smug. And then, as though he’d just remembered, “We’re not doing this.” and then he went back to his paper.

Sherlock, for his part, fell into an almighty sulk that lasted all. damn. day. He made it impossible for John to finish the crossword.

“Alopecia.”

“Sherlock.”

“Hydrangea.”

“ _Sherlock_.”

He turned his back to Sherlock so he couldn’t see the paper at all.

“Sanguine, matrilineal, Yanomamo.”

John had binned the paper after that. Sod the crossword. Except he couldn’t watch television, either. Sherlock took it upon himself to make that, too, a singularly unenjoyable experience. He ruined the plot of every show within the first five minutes, including an episode of Game of Thrones that John had been particularly looking forward to. He threw the remote at Sherlock, who dodged it with considerable aplomb and a self-satisfied smirk.

The steak John had been saving for dinner mysteriously vanished, the tea kettle was currently housing human finger bones, and John was trying to salvage the evening with a beer and a true crime novel, but every time he tried to read, Sherlock tortured his violin into producing shrieks of unholy racket. It was impressive, really, since Sherlock wasn’t even in the room.

“How does he know?” John muttered.

He gave up on reading for the night. He took a last pull of his beer and threw it into the trash. He turned off each of the lights in the flat and went up to his room, pausing at Sherlock’s room as he walked past on his way to the stairs. Yellow light was spilling out into the hallway from the crack beneath the door, and John hesitated. It was quiet in there now. He didn’t seem to actually be _playing_ the violin so much as enjoying torturing John with it.

John turned on the light in his room and flopped on the bed, sprawled out and just enjoying the feel of it. He closed his eyes and reveled in the silent peace of his bedroom. He stayed like that for a while just drowsing, but pleasant as the bed was, he couldn’t sleep just yet. He wasn’t tired.

He eyed the book he’d been reading earlier. He’d brought it upstairs with him, and it was currently sitting on the little table by his bed. Sherlock had been quiet for a while now. He’d probably lost interest in this particular game, seeing as he’d won.

John smirked and picked up the dog-eared paperback, feeling very smug and self-satisfied. Outsmarting the great Sherlock Holmes indeed. He flipped it open to the page he’d been reading—

_The night was mean and dim. Jacobsen checked his sidearm out of habit, taking comfort in the feel of its familiar weight in his—_

_Screech shriek screech_ , and there was the awful violin again.

John threw his book at the wall and shoved his pillow over his head, groaning.

* * *

“All right,” John said at the kitchen table the next day, sipping his tea and looking considerably worse for the wear. “I’ll do it, but we’re going to have some ground rules.”

“ _Boring_.”

“Sherlock, maintaining your _brain function_ is hardly boring. You of all people seem particularly fond of your brain, and—”

Sherlock ignored him and plowed full steam ahead after hearing the magic words _I’ll do it_ , and John wasn’t sure Sherlock had actually heard anything he’d said after that.

“I’ve done some research.” Sherlock interrupted. “The human body can survive for approximately six minutes without oxygen before permanent damage occurs, so I’d like to see how long I’m able to fight. We might have to do it in stages, since I want to check my responses every thirty seconds or so—”

“Okay, stop. Did you hear what I said about ground rules?”

Sherlock made a noncommittal noise that John figured amounted to _Yes, but I’m pretending I didn’t, and I think if I keep talking you’ll let it alone._

“First rule: I am not holding you underwater for _six minutes_. Humans pass out from lack of oxygen, Sherlock, much sooner than brain damage occurs.”

“Yes, well if you hadn’t interrupted, you’d have known that I accounted for that. You’ll hold my head underwater until I lose consciousness, of course. It’s useful data.”

“ _No_ , I didn’t agree to that. That’s _dangerous_ , Sherlock. I’ll hold you under for one minute, which is long enough to be mightily uncomfortable.”

“John,” Sherlock wheedled, drawing his name out and sounding for all the world like a child denied a sweet, but John was utterly unwilling to concede on this.

“One minute, take it or leave it,” he said, with a thread of steel in his voice.

Sherlock stared him down in that way he sometimes had, the one that made John feel like a butterfly pinned on velvet, a specimen to observe. It made him feel uncomfortable and too warm, but he held Sherlock’s fey gaze.

Sherlock looked away first. “Fine.”

John blew out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. God, this was going to be a mistake.

* * *

So that was how John Watson found himself standing awkwardly in the kitchen, steeling himself to drown his flatmate. The kitchen sink had been cleaned at John’s insistence—there was a particularly gruesome experiment in there the week earlier involving a severed foot—and filled. There was a small stack of dry, clean towels piled on the counter. The counter had been emptied of anything potentially hazardous, again at John’s insistence. Because as much as he was apparently willing to go along with this (ridiculous, certifiable) experiment, he drew the line at actually being bludgeoned by anything like their dead victim.

“John, really, I wouldn’t actually harm you,” Sherlock had protested, and John had pointed out that he actually had no idea how he would react to being bodily drowned, and although he’d never admit it, Sherlock had conceded the point.

And now they were here: the sink was filled, Sherlock was standing next to it in a more pared-down version of his usual attire—the suit jacket had come off, and he’d rolled up his shirtsleeves to his elbows just as John had—looking increasingly impatient.

“Well?” he said, frowning. Clearly he was wondering what John’s problem was and why he was being so unnecessarily _difficult_ about this, and John had to suppress a hysterical giggle.

“Right,”  he said instead, tamping down the hysteria and steeling himself. “Could you,” he gestured to the sink, and Sherlock took the hint, bending at the waist until his head was just above the water, his nose almost skimming the top of it.

“Right,” John said again. Cleared his throat. “Deep breath” he said.

“John—” Sherlock started, clearly exasperated and about to say something biting, but he didn’t finish the thought before John grabbed his head and forced it under the water.

He didn’t hold it under long, just dunked it really, but when he pulled Sherlock up, he was gasping and sputtering for breath. “I wasn’t ready!”

“Because Elizabeth Madderson really had so much warning, yeah?” John took comfort in the familiarity of their banter, even though he didn’t care one whit about the veracity of the experimental setup.

“Elizabeth Madderson was drowned in a _bathtub_ , may I remind you, which _you_ refuse to let us use.”

“Yeah, because I’m not having you die on me.” He was a doctor, but he didn’t actually know how long it would take before Sherlock passed out, and he wasn’t taking any chances. At least if Sherlock blacked out at the kitchen sink, John would notice that he’d gone limp. “Not fun, was it? Want to call it quits now?”

Sherlock glared at him, and John couldn’t suppress a snort of amusement. He looked like a wet cat. “Again,” Sherlock said.

John sighed and placed a hand on the middle of Sherlock’s back and pushed him forward. He threaded his hands through the dark, wet curls and tried to ignore the complicated jolt he felt through his groin at that. “Ten seconds this time.”

Sherlock opened his mouth to complain, but John cut him off by prompting him to take another breath. To his credit, Sherlock did.

John shoved him under again, and it was smoother this time. He counted off the seconds under his breath until it was time to let Sherlock up. He came out of the water panting for breath but seeming no worse for the wear.

“Really, John, ten seconds?”

“Important to establish a baseline isn’t it? Ready to go again?”

Sherlock nodded.

“Thirty seconds this time,” John said, and plunged him back into the water.

Sherlock rested his hands on the edge of the sink, and he could see the moment it started getting difficult, when Sherlock’s fingers tightened on the edge of the basin. He counted out thirty seconds and then pulled him up again, and Sherlock gasped for breath. He seemed… different this time. His cheeks were flushed and he was panting.

“Alright?” John asked.

“Yeah,” Sherlock said. “Yes, I’m alright.”

John frowned. He sounded quiet, almost… docile. It was rather alarming, if John was being honest with himself. And yet despite himself, he found himself saying, “Again?”

They had agreed on a full minute, after all. Sherlock nodded and drew in a breath.

He pushed him in gently this time, his hand still curled into the hair at the back of his neck. Once again, John counted out the seconds: _30, 31, 32_

It wasn’t until 40 that Sherlock started to struggle, just a little, trying to fight John’s hand and come up for breath. John took a deep breath himself and clutched Sherlock tighter, using a bit of his strength to keep his head underwater.

_41, 42, 43, 44_

Sherlock’s fingers were scrabbling at the sink now, fighting for purchase, reaching back to try to push John off. John sidestepped it easily and kept counting.

_45, 46, 47_

Sherlock was thrashing in earnest now, slopping water up the side of the sink and soaking John’s clothes. But John had the upper hand in this position, and he doggedly kept Sherlock’s head under.

_48, 49, 50_

At 55, Sherlock went still, and John’s heart caught in his throat. He hauled Sherlock up, the full minute be damned.

When Sherlock emerged from the water this time, his face was bright red and he gasped, pulling air into lungs that had to have been burning by now. He let the breath go on a thready moan, barely there, so soft that John could have imagined it. His eyes flicked to Sherlock’s crotch of their own volition, and he noticed that Sherlock definitely had an erection. He dragged his eyes away, ( _what the hell is wrong with you, Watson_ ) and looked at Sherlock’s face. The water beading on Sherlock’s eyelashes looked like tears caught in his eyes, and John felt his groin tighten uncomfortably.

Oh, he was going to hell for this.

John realized belatedly that _he_ was panting like he’d been the one underwater and set about making a show of checking Sherlock’s vitals for something to distract him. He shifted his weight to adjust his erection, hoping Sherlock didn’t notice and peered into Sherlock’s eyes, checking his pupils. His lips were fine, good color.

“Squeeze my hand,” John murmured, holding his hand out for Sherlock who gave it a firm press.

“Good,” John said brusquely. He realized belatedly that he still had his hand on the nape of Sherlock’s neck and yanked it back as though he’d been burned. “You should probably take off those wet clothes and have a warm shower,” John said. He was talking too much. “Lay down if you feel faint. Do you, um, need anything?”

“No, I’m fine.” Sherlock had the queerest look on his face, with color high in his cheeks. He watched as John beat a hasty retreat back to his room and shut the door safely between them, then locked it for good measure.

_What the hell was that?_

And why had he _liked_ it?


	2. Chapter 2

When John came out of his bedroom one extremely shame-filled round of masturbation later, it was because he couldn’t ignore the growling in his stomach any longer. He’d been hoping to stay in his room for the rest of the night, but his stomach apparently had other plans. He tried to think of the last time he’d eaten, and he thought it might have been the biscuit he’d had with tea that morning. It had been a hectic day at the clinic, one of those days where he’d scarcely had time to sit and think, let alone have lunch. And then he’d gotten home and launched into Sherlock’s latest mad plan and had forgotten to eat, and by now the sun was already gone behind the London skyline and night was fast approaching.

He hoped Sherlock wouldn’t be around, that maybe he’d have gone to take a nap too, but apparently the universe couldn’t give him a break like that. He walked downstairs and found Sherlock perched on the couch, resting back on his haunches because of course he could never just  _ sit _ like a normal person.

His hair was still wet from the shower he’d presumably taken, and the sight of his damp hair made something in John’s stomach curl. Great, was this just how it was going to be now? Him, forever going daft at the sight of his flatmate out of the shower?

John studiously avoided him and walked into the kitchen, banging around in the cupboards with more vehemence than strictly necessary. There were no groceries in the flat, again. The fridge was taken up by spare parts—hopefully animal—and there wasn’t a lick of food in it.

Well. At least there was a carton of orange juice. At the insistence of his growling stomach, John pulled it out. Better than nothing. Feeling a bit rebellious, he decided to drink it straight from the carton. Sherlock wasn’t the only one who could make a mess of things—and one sputtering moment later, spitting into the sink, he realized the OJ had gone off.

“Don’t drink that carton in the fridge!” Sherlock called, belatedly.

“What, this orange juice that’s clearly gone off?”

“That’s not orange juice.”

“What?! Then what the bloody hell is it?” John rounded the corner to look at Sherlock, still scrubbing his tongue on the sleeve of his jumper to try to get that wretched taste out of his mouth.

“Mold culture.” Sherlock frowned. “Didn’t I just tell you not to drink it?”

“ _ After _ ,” John all but shouted. “You told me after I’d already drinken it, you arse. What have I told you about labeling your experiments?”

Sherlock huffed. “I’m not your child, John.”

“Then stop bloody acting like it.”

Sherlock tilted his head. “Is this one of those times where you’re really upset about something else? Because if so, you’re really going to have to tell me. Is this about what happened earlier?”

“No, this is about me being irritated that you fed me  _ mold cultures _ and the fact that there’s no food in this flat.”

“Are you sure? Because the last time you accidentally ingested a nonfood substance, you—”

“Stop!” John thrust the container of orange juice/mold at Sherlock and brushed past him, knocking the other man’s shoulder with his own in his haste to get out of the kitchen. He softened his voice a little. “Just stop. Okay? I’m irritated because I haven’t had anything to eat all day, and I can’t deal with one more weird thing until I’ve got some food in me. I’m going out for takeaway. You want anything?”

Sherlock eyed him speculatively. “Pad thai, if you please.”

“Right. Pad thai, fine.”

John took his jacket and left.

The walk to and from the Thai restaurant was uneventful, if chilly, and the night air helped to clear John’s mind. He felt like a bit of an arse, truth be told. Certainly Sherlock was annoying, but no more than usual, and John had royally freaked out for no reason.

Well. Not for no reason. Because he’d drowned his flatmate in the kitchen sink and he’d  _ liked _ it, and then he’d masturbated to the memory later. Now that he admitted it to himself, it was even more fucked up than he’d thought. He knocked his head against the door to 221B Baker Street and groaned.

There was no way Sherlock hadn’t seen through his little tantrum about the mold, no matter that he’d asked for clarification. John had no doubt in his mind that Sherlock had probably worked it all out by now, and he was going to go inside and Sherlock would probably cut him down to little ribbons for it, for being such a pervert, and he’d  _ deserve it _ .

Maybe he’d at least let John keep the pad see ew.

Probably not.

He kept his eyes shut, his head resting against the door for another minute. Anyone passing by probably thought he was a lunatic. The kind of lunatic that got off on drowning people? Maybe. 

Right then, time to stop being a coward. He took a deep breath to steady himself and walked up the stairs.

Sherlock was playing something on the violin, something hectic and haunting, and he didn’t stop when John came in. John put the bag of takeaway on the table and fished through it to get his food, meaning to take it up to his room. Sherlock played the last few bars of whatever piece of music that was before leaving off on a ringing note that lingered in the air after he pulled the bow away.

“That was beautiful,” John said, despite himself. Because, well, it was.

Sherlock ignored the comment in favor of asking, “Did you bring the pad thai?” but a little ghost of a smile played at the edges of his mouth at John’s compliment.

“Yep,” John said, gesturing at the bag. 

Making a split second decision, John decided to stay instead of scurrying back to his room, and he sank onto the couch. The force of the drop knocked the air out of him in a  _ whuff _ as he sat down. The slouchy cushions sucked him in, and he relaxed into it for a moment before sitting forward to open his container of food. 

Sherlock, for his part, pulled up a chair and sat opposite John, gamely reaching into the bag to retrieve his own meal. He peeled back the flaps of the takeaway carton and cracked open the wooden chopsticks, but it took John a while to realize that he wasn’t actually eating.

Instead, he was staring at John, studying his face. Feeling self-conscious, John studiously focused on his own noodles and didn’t look up. He decided not to comment on Sherlock’s lack of eating. He’d eat when he felt like it. Maybe. 

“Lestrade called,” Sherlock said conversationally.

“Oh? What for?”

“He wanted to see if we’d made any progress on his case. It seems I’m ‘taking longer than usual to natter on about how incompetent the police force is.’” Sherlock made a face.

John laughed. “He’s calling  _ you _ slow now? Never thought I’d see the day.” 

It wasn’t really that funny, but John was just glad to have something normal to talk about. He didn’t want to talk about what happened earlier, and he was glad that Sherlock didn’t bring it up.

Sherlock’s phone chimed, and he made a gesture at John, who fished it out of his coat and handed it across the table. Sherlock had begun eating by now, and his pad thai was balanced on one knee. He absently ate noodles with one hand (surprisingly deft with the chopsticks) while he texted with the other. It shouldn’t be possible for someone to look so absurdly graceful while doing something so patently ridiculous.

They didn’t talk much for the rest of the dinner, but the silence was companionable. Whatever charged strangeness had lingered after that afternoon seemed to have dissipated, and John finally relaxed.

This was good. It had been an odd experiment like any other at 221B, and Sherlock had got what data he needed from it, and it didn’t bear mentioning again. Good. Why did he feel a hollow little pang of disappointment about it?

After they’d eaten, John got up to clear the rubbish and put the leftovers into the fridge that was now blessedly empty of anything besides food. Sherlock didn’t even look up as John took his now-abandoned meal. He was dead to the world, deeply engrossed in whatever text conversation he was having, and probably would be for the rest of the night. John bid Sherlock goodnight (which went unacknowledged) and flicked off the light to the kitchen before heading off to bed.

* * *

The next morning, Sherlock was his usual, absent self. He was at present flipping through two medical books while making notes into his laptop. John squinted at it, still bleary from a bad night’s sleep. No, scratch that.  _ John’s _ laptop.

John shook his head and wandered into the kitchen to make tea. At the very least, Sherlock seemed to have lost interest in giving John those highly unsettling, searching looks, which John thought was a good sign. The tea kettle clicked, and John made two cups, one with milk and one with sugar, and set one in front of Sherlock. He went back for his toast and settled in to look through the paper.

Sherlock waited until John was onto the fourth page before he said, casually— _ too  _ casually— “John?”

“Mm?” He didn’t look up from the paper.

“I was thinking we might collect more data today.”

“Okay,” John said, taking a sip of his tea. He squinted at the paper, put it down, squinted at Sherlock whose face was the picture of angelic innocence. “What kind of data?”

Sherlock waved a hand. “The experiment we did yesterday, I don’t need just a single data point. I need more. More trials.”

“No,” John said flatly. “I am not doing that again.”

“Oh, good!”

“Wait, what?”

Sherlock sighed, put upon, as though he couldn’t believe John needed so many things spelled out for him. “I already told you, I need more data points. A single test subject isn’t enough. That’s bad science, John.”

“You live for bad science,” John pointed out.

Sherlock flapped a hand. “Irrelevant. So that’s settled. We’ll try it on you next.”

The protest was right on the tip of John’s tongue. He would say no, of course not, because that was crazy. That wasn’t something friends did. Hell, that wasn’t something  _ anybody _ did. He looked at Sherlock who looked focused, interested. The cool icy blue of his eyes, the bow of that mouth…

He should say no. He was going to say no. But what happened the last time had been so heady that he wanted to try it just one more time.

So he said, “Yes.”

John had expected that they’d get right to it, after it had been agreed upon, and he said as much.

“Should I go fill up the sink?” he asked.

“Hmm?” Sherlock had gone back to his notes by then, and his attention had entirely withdrawn from their earlier conversation. “For what?”

“For the…  _ you know _ . Experiment,” he finished lamely. Somehow it was less terrifying if he didn’t put a name to it.

“Ah.” Sherlock scribbled something down. “No, that won’t be necessary. We’ll do it later.”

John was on edge for the rest of the morning, anticipating  _ later _ . He was filled with a buzzy, nervous energy, which he got out by tidying the flat. He threw out stacks of papers and some dessicated looking… well he didn’t know what that was, but he thought it might have once been fruit. 

He thought that Sherlock must certainly have noticed him acting so twitchy, but if he did, he didn’t say anything of it. Sherlock had retreated into one of his pensive moods, and he spent most of the day deep in his own head, wrapped up in his thoughts. When John tidied around him or, at one point, kicked Sherlock’s leg to get him to move it off the pile of case files he was trying to put onto the mantle, Sherlock didn’t seem to notice.

By the evening, John was feeling much more settled. Sherlock had been playing his violin for the better part of an hour, and what he was playing was such a delicate, sweet tune. Actually, John found himself in quite good spirits. He’d decided that Sherlock might have forgotten about the proposed experiment as the day wore on. He was relieved and… disappointed? No, that was absurd. Of course he wasn’t  _ disappointed _ that he wasn’t going to be drowned. 

The soft sound of Sherlock’s moan came to mind unbidden, the sweet gasp for air that he’d let out as he came up, utterly abandoned. John bit his lip and pushed the thought away, looked up for confirmation that Sherlock hadn’t caught that, that we wasn’t reading every one of John’s dirty secrets plain as day on his face.

But no, Sherlock was facing the window, playing on.

He decided he might as well start typing up the blog post for their last case. He’d been putting it off, but he had nothing to do tonight. The clinic didn’t need him back until Friday, and the flat was already as clean as it was ever going to get. Any cleaner and he’d have to start chucking things, and  Sherlock would throw a fit.

So he started in on the blog, and he ended up engrossed in the work. Although the people he knew best would call him a doctor or soldier if asked to describe him, John was a writer through and through. He liked the simple, plodding steadiness of committing word after word to a page. There was something satisfying in the simple act of telling a story and trying to do it well.

He must have been absorbed in his work for longer than he thought, because when he looked up, an hour had gone by and he had a crick in his neck. He stretched with a groan and relished the pop of his back as he extended his arms over his head.

Tea, then.

Yes, tea would be a nice break. John wandered into the kitchen and flipped on the kettle, then set about putting a tea bag into his mug. He rolled his shoulders, trying to stretch out his neck where it still felt pinched. He turned around, meaning to stick his head out the kitchen and ask Sherlock if he’d have a cup too, and was shocked when Sherlock was right behind him, looming in the entrance of the kitchen.

“Jesus, Sherlock. You’re lucky I wasn’t holding a cup of tea.”

“Luck has nothing to do with it. It takes four minutes for water to boil in that kettle assuming it’s full. You’ve been in here for three.” Sherlock reached over and flipped the tea kettle off. “There was never any possibility of you holding boiling water.”

John frowned, irritated. “I was making tea.”

“You were,” Sherlock agreed. “But now we’re going to do an experiment.”

Sherlock didn’t have a good conception of personal space on the best day, but now he was crowding up against John in a way that was making the kitchen feel small and hot.

“I’m in the middle of a blog,” John said, trying to sound irritated but his voice came out more strained than he’d intended. 

By now, Sherlock had him crowded against the counter, not touching but only just. He was so close that John could smell him, expensive soap and a scent that was pure  _ Sherlock _ . His eyes were predatory as they raked over John, searching and cataloging, and John felt a surge of warmth in his belly.

“You’ve been staring at me for the last twenty minutes. It’s distracting.”

John swallowed. “You were playing the violin and looking out the window. You can’t know that.”

_ That’s not a denial, though, is it? _ The part of John’s mind that sounded like Sherlock said.

Sherlock grinned, unsettling and wolfish. “I can multitask. Now if you want me to stop this, you’re going to have to tell me so right now.”

John’s eyes flicked from Sherlock to the sink that was already full to the brim. When had Sherlock done that? How had he not noticed earlier? He must have filled it while John was occupied with his typing. Sherlock waited a beat, and John didn’t use that time to say  _ wait no _ , to say  _ stop _ or to say  _ Jesus Christ, can you give me a little space? _

And then Sherlock’s hands were on him, clutching his shoulders and turning him around brusquely. John felt like he was being frisked as Sherlock got him neatly pressed against the sink with ruthless efficiency. The edge of the basin dug into his hip where he was pushed against it, and although he was wearing a thick jumper so of course he couldn’t  _ really _ feel Sherlock’s hands through it, John could swear his fingers burned him where they touched.

“Last chance,” Sherlock said, his breath ghosting over the nape of John’s neck and making the tiny vellus hairs stand on end. John said nothing, too busy focusing on breathing steadily in and out through his nose. Being manhandled like this had  _ definitely _ gotten his cock’s interest.

“Now tell me the truth,” Sherlock said in his ear, voice so low that it was almost a rumble, a sound that sent a frisson through his flesh. “You liked doing this to me, didn’t you?”

John’s head snapped back to look at Sherlock, his eyebrows drawing together in concern. “Of course not!” he said, but then Sherlock was pushing him, dunking him under the water before he could finish the thought. He wasn’t half as gentle as John himself had been, John noted and rather hysterically thought maybe he needn’t have been so careful.

He inhaled a mouthful of water and coughed it out, sputtering as he pulled himself out of the water. Sherlock clearly wasn’t intending on holding him under, just wetting him.

“Sherlock,  _ what the hell _ —” John started.

“The truth, John. You liked holding me under, seeing me gasp, seeing me struggle.”

John squirmed, ready to object again.

“Ah,” Sherlock said softly. “So it  _ was _ the struggling. I wasn’t sure.”

“I’m not a pervert,” John protested hotly. He could feel his cheeks burn and hoped he wasn’t blushing.

“Of course not.  _ Pervert _ is a meaningless shaming word used to castigate individuals with sexual preferences outside of the cultural norm. How did you so charmingly put it? ‘It’s all fine.’”

“Do  _ you _ like it?” John spat, turning the question back around on Sherlock.

Sherlock paused for a moment, as though he was really considering the question. “Not the way you think.” He grabbed John again, but more gently this time, his large hand feeling like a caress as it enveloped the back of John’s wet head. Then that voice like dark velvet again, soft and hot against John’s ear. “But I certainly don’t mind it. Deep breath, now.”

John sucked in a breath just in time to be plunged under again. This time Sherlock held him down, and he realized they hadn’t talked about timing, how long or how much. Surely Sherlock wouldn’t actually drown him, right? The seconds dragged on, and John’s lungs began to burn. He could feel his diaphragm starting to spasm as the urge to breathe grew stronger and stronger and with it a corresponding throb in his cock. His fingers splayed wide against the sink, scrabbling for purchase as Sherlock let go, just as he was beginning to feel the creeping edge of panic sink in.

The first gasp of air felt delicious as he pulled it into his aching lungs. He just breathed for a second before he remembered he was supposed to be irritated.

“Are you planning on doing this until I tell you that I liked holding you under?”

“Not really. I already know that you liked it. I was rather thinking I might keep doing this until you come in your pants.”

John gulped hard enough that it might have been audible, and he couldn’t suppress the shudder that ran through him at that.

“Tell me to stop,” Sherlock said again, and John kept his lips resolutely sealed shut, suddenly overwhelmingly grateful. It was so much easier to say nothing than to have to say yes.

He was plunged under again, and the sudden lack of breath met him once more. He sank into the clawing pain in his lungs as they were denied air.  _ Oxygen is brought into the lungs via breathing, where it is transported by red blood cells to the entire body to be used to produce energy _ , he thought, recalling a passage from a medical textbook. Except right now, when oxygen was denied the lungs via Sherlock, that mad beautiful bastard whose long violinist’s fingers were currently engaged in the task of keeping John’s head below the water.

He hauled him back up. John was immediately assaulted by a rush of fresh, blessed air and the devastating filth that was pouring from Sherlock’s mouth, dark and thrumming with wicked promise.

“I could do this all day, you know. Keep you on the edge between consciousness and oblivion. I can read everything in the lines of your body, in the tension in your neck.” He followed his words with a fingertip, trailing it over John’s neck and down his spine tantalizingly slowly. “You’re safe with me, you know. I would never hurt you by accident.”

_ Only on purpose. _

His words ripped another shudder from John. He was a quivering mess under the sound of Sherlock’s voice, the ruinous things he was saying. He felt flayed open, a mess of want with all his worst desires laid open and bare for Sherlock to dissect with keen eyes.

“Time for you to talk, I think. Do you want me to drown you, John?”

John didn’t say anything; he just stared at the bow of Sherlock’s mouth, hoping his eyes would do the talking for him. Sherlock shook him gently by the neck, a bit like a dog shaking its pup by the scruff.

“No, I think silence won’t suffice this time. I’ve let you get away with that long enough. Say it.”

“I—” John broke off. His cheeks were burning as he met Sherlock’s gaze, seeing his friend’s pupils blown wide with lust and something darker. John licked his lips and tried again. “Yes,” he whispered.

A slow, dangerous smile poured itself over Sherlock’s face. He pressed a chaste kiss that felt like a benediction against John’s temple, then doused him again. “You can struggle, you know,” was the last thing John heard before he heard nothing but the muted, distorted sounds of water against his ears.

This time John was ready for it and he welcomed it. He let the chill water cool his hot shame at having to  _ admit _ to wanting this, to liking it.

It was too much this time, much too much. John hadn’t planned to struggle, but he did, fighting to pull his head above the water as the pain in his chest swelled to a crescendo, body crying out for air. Sherlock deftly kept his head below the surface, leaning into him with his upper body to keep him pinned under the weight of one long arm. Amidst his thrashing and the rising desperate thirst for oxygen, John didn’t think to wonder at that. He didn’t think to wonder about anything at all: not his sexuality, not whether he was fucked up for wanting his flatmate, not whether this was the most stupid, dangerous, fucked up thing he’d ever done in his life. Everything was stripped away until he was pinpoint focused on the pure, clean desire to breathe.

And then Sherlock’s other hand reached down to press hard against John’s cock that was achingly hard in his pants. He ground the heel of his palm against it once, twice, and then John was coming with an intensity that blinded him. He sucked in water unthinking, and then Sherlock was dragging him out again, pounding on his back and telling him to breathe.

“Breathe, John, breathe,” he said as John spit up water. 

He was hacking and coughing, and this was certainly the worst he’d ever felt after an orgasm.

“Here, sit down.” Sherlock led him over to the couch where he dripped water all over the upholstery. When he’d finally stopped coughing enough to look around, he saw that Sherlock had produced a towel from somewhere. He set about drying John’s face and hair with a carefulness that was so at odds with his usual frenetic energy.

When he was finished, satisfied that John was dry and no longer in danger of drowning for real, he settled the towel around John’s shoulders. Without the towel to occupy his hands, Sherlock suddenly looked as awkward as John felt. 

“I, ah, didn’t consider the fact that you might aspirate water at the moment of orgasm,” Sherlock said, an odd look of bewildered annoyance on his face.

Well that did it. That popped the bubble of tension that had been looming over them. John started laughing, how could he not? He was listening to his roommate talk about the finer points of erotic asphyxiation while ruining their couch and sitting with semen in his pants that was rapidly becoming chilled and very uncomfortable.

“It’s an honest mistake,” Sherlock said, brows drawing together like storm clouds gathering. He sounded mildly affronted. “I did the calculations this afternoon, and I—”

“Sherlock,” John said and gave him a look, until Sherlock cracked a smile and began to chuckle too. His chuckle turned into a full-bodied laugh as they tossed their heads back and gave into mirth.

The laughter died down after a time, the way laughter always did, leaving behind a lingering awkwardness. Sherlock seemed content to just study John, running his eyes over John’s face in a way that felt like a caress. John felt the sudden, fierce urge to kiss him and tamped it back down before realizing how utterly ridiculous that was. The man had just brought him to orgasm with his hands and voice.

John cleared his throat and tried again, meaning to sound stern this time. “Sherlock,” he said again. “That was… a bit not good.”

“No?” He cocked an eyebrow. “You certainly seemed to enjoy it.”

John could feel himself flushing right to the tips of his ears. “It’s not  _ safe _ ,” he persisted. “There are a dozen things that could have gone wrong. What if I’d drowned?”

Sherlock scoffed. “I would have known immediately if you had been in actual distress. I would never have let anything happen to you. Surely you know that.”

“What if I had actually wanted you to let me up?”

That seemed to give Sherlock pause, and he chewed on his lip, thinking.

He was silent for so long that John couldn’t tell if he was still present or if he’d vacated to somewhere in his mind palace. “Sherlock?” he tried. “Sherlock?”

He didn’t get an answer, and he was tired of sitting in wet clothes, so he got up with a sigh and plodded resolutely up the stairs to shower and change... and possibly drown himself in the bath so he’d never, ever have to think of this again. John winced internally at the thought— that metaphor was a bit too on the nose, now wasn’t it?


	3. Chapter 3

Things returned to normal after that, or as close to normal as could be had around 221B. Sherlock didn’t bring it up again so John didn’t either. He assumed that Sherlock had grown bored with whatever game that had been after John had voiced his reservations, and if John was a little disappointed by how easily Sherlock had given up, well, it had been a while since he’d had any kind of sexual contact, hadn’t it? A man had needs and of course it could be easy to get confused by a good orgasm, even if that orgasm was brought about by your daft flatmate’s latest experiment.

If he fantasized in the shower with the water running down his cheeks as he pulled himself off in quick, punishing strokes, well… He didn’t actually have a way to rationalize that. He mostly just tried not to think on it.

Things had been _so_ normal, and that’s why John didn’t understand what was happening when Sherlock barged into his room. They’d gotten back from a case where Sherlock had been stunningly brilliant, as usual. After Chinese at a place that Sherlock had told him, not asked him, that they were going to. Sherlock had ordered for the table, and despite John protesting that he hadn’t wanted Chinese, it had been perfect.

Sherlock watched him with a smug look on his face as John had cleaned his plate, and John had thrown his napkin at him.

John was lying in bed, full, tired, and deliciously sore. His limbs felt heavy with the satisfying burn of hard use, and he was lying in his bed just luxuriating in the feel of it. He’d been drowsing and halfway to sleep when his door suddenly banged open.

He started off the bed, arms untangling themselves from where they were pillowing his head. He had his gun in hand by the time his brain caught up and realized that it was Sherlock (not a threat). It took his startled brain a few more seconds to recognize that Sherlock looked temptingly… undressed.

His shirt was untucked and his sleeves were rolled up to his elbows. John felt like he was living out some kind of bizarre Victorian fantasy because it was absurd that that little bit of skin—bared forearms, a hint of collarbone where the top two buttons of his starched white shirt were undone—was enough to set his heart pounding.

Adrenaline, or something else?

Either way, he was on high alert. “Sherlock, is something wrong?”

Terrible as his manners and sense of personal space were, he didn’t typically come into John’s room. Not so much out of a sense of uncharacteristic propriety, John figured, so much that he probably found it unbearably dull.

“Everything’s fine, John.” He said quietly, voice rumbling. John caught himself staring at those ridiculous lips. He swallowed.

“Then what—”

“The other day,” Sherlock started. “You said that what we were doing was dangerous.” He was trying to be delicate, John could tell, but even so he spat out the word _dangerous_ like it personally offended him.

“What we were doing—” John caught on. “You mean the… experiment?”

Sherlock gave a half shrug. “If you like. If I could find a way to make it safe,” he hesitated for a fraction of a second, so that anyone who knew him less well might not have noticed it at all, and then the words came out in a slightly too-quick rush. “Would you want to do it again?”

“If you—” John realized he was doing the thing that Sherlock hated, where he repeated his words without adding any new information, but this was going to take some doing to wrap his brain around. A jolt of heat shot straight to his groin as he realized what Sherlock was asking.

He took the coward’s way out.

“There’s no safe way to do… that,” John said, and as much as he tried, he couldn’t keep the note of rue from his voice.

“Not that exactly,” Sherlock allowed. “But a reasonable facsimile of it. Is that something you’d want?” His voice had gone soft, and John realized with a start that he looked… _nervous_. Sherlock Holmes who’d faced down snipers and Semtex with grim determination all of a sudden looked nervous in the face of whatever this was.

The heartbreaking vulnerability of it was the only thing that could have given John the courage to take the leap and say, “Yes. I— yes.”

Sherlock took the risk and came the majority of the way; the very least John could do was meet him there.

“Do you trust me?”

Now that John had started saying it, it was like a dam had broken. “Yes,” he breathed.

Sherlock crossed the room in two steps of those long limbs and reached up to hover a hand beside John’s face. It was almost a caress. He wasn’t touching but just letting his hand hover above John’s cheek, so close that John could feel the warmth of his palm.

John pressed his face into Sherlock’s hand like a cat and was rewarded with a stroke down the side of his face, and Christ that felt better than it had any right to. Sherlock’s face was unmistakably fond as he pressed John backwards until his knees hit the back of the bed, and he didn’t so much as sit as make a controlled fall onto it. Sherlock followed, somehow graceful with it. John scooted back until his back was pressed against the headboard and Sherlock followed, crawling on his hands and knees with dark purpose in his eyes.

He put his face right up against John’s and inhaled, breathing deep and letting his eyes fall closed. John tried to surge forward to capture his lips with his own, but a firm hand on his shoulder thwarted him, pushed him back against the headboard. John was half hard already, and his breath sounded ragged and loud in the quiet stillness of his bedroom.

“Trust me,” Sherlock murmured scant centimeters from his mouth. And then he pulled back abruptly, leaving John cold from the sudden lack of body heat.

The anxiety of the moment, of not knowing what was coming next only seemed to stoke his desire. The anticipation was delicious.

“Take off your clothes,” Sherlock said, as casually as if he were asking John to pass him his mobile.

A thrill of shame shocked through John, and he moaned.

Sherlock stood utterly unmoved as he regarded John, waiting to be obeyed, but John could see the playful spark in his eyes, the flush on his cheeks as John did as he was told, got up, and started to strip.

He didn’t make a show of it. He’d have felt too silly, honestly. He wasn’t a woman, nor a young man. He knew what he looked like, and while he wasn’t ashamed of his body, he was under no delusions that it was anything but what it was—the body of a retired army doctor, a little soft around the middle, scarred and getting older. He took off his clothes efficiently and unhurriedly. Whatever game Sherlock was playing, he didn’t seem to be in a rush, so John wasn’t either.

At last John stood in the room bare naked as the day he as born. It was chilly, now, without his jumper. The cold leaked in even through the closed window, seeping through the thin pane of glass. Sherlock dragged his eyes over John’s body, not lingering in any one place, just steadily moving. Categorizing.

John thought to make a joke, to ask if he liked what he saw, but the words died on his tongue before he could speak them. He closed his eyes and clenched his fists unconsciously, trying to will down his embarrassment. Trying to will down the erection that seemed increasingly persistent in the face of his embarrassment.

His eyes were still closed, and Sherlock took John’s fists in his two hands and unclenched them, a bit of human kindness that did somewhat to put John at ease. Then he guided John back down onto the bed with a single hand to his chest, and that touch—where Sherlock had never touched before—seared his skin.

John settled himself back against the pillows, and Sherlock sat beside him. He trailed one wisp-gentle finger down John’s flank and drew a shudder from him. Sherlock repeated the motion, dragging the tips of his fingers up and down John’s body in long, smooth strokes with just enough pressure not to tickle.

“You are attractive, you know.” Sherlock sounded as though he were talking to himself, musing aloud. “Cultural standards of beauty are—” He cut himself off. “You are lovely to look at.”

“Thank you,” John said, and it came out as barely more than a whisper.

Suddenly looking at Sherlock was too much. Being unallowed to kiss, unable to do anything but lie there and submit to his scrutiny and touch, it was too much, and John closed his eyes again to shut it out.

“Look at me,” Sherlock said immediately. He trailed those long, graceful fingers over John’s temple, over his cheeks, the pads of his fingers just catching on the stubble of his jaw.

John didn’t. His eyelids felt leaden, and he didn’t want to open them, didn’t want to see what new hell of _too much_ would be there. Sherlock’s thumb ghosted over his lower lip, prompting it to part as he pulled it down just slightly, as though testing it.

“John.” He said again, and there was a command in the low rumble of his voice this time. “Look at me.”

He did. Sherlock’s eyes met his, and he was rewarded with a scant kiss to his forehead, just a glancing brush of lips.

“Good, John. Now here is what’s going to happen. I’m going to suffocate you until you beg me to stop.” A low groan slid out of John. Christ, this man was going to be the death of him.

Sherlock brought one hand up to cover John’s mouth, eyes glinting. “And you’re going to maintain eye contact the whole time.”

John’s eyes widened, and he opened his mouth to protest. That was mortifying. He couldn’t imagine having to _look_ at Sherlock through that. But then the thought of it… there was that shame again, and that peculiar connection it seemed to have with his cock which was already harder than ever at the idea.

“You wanted to do this safely,” Sherlock reminded him. “This is the safest way I know of. If you lose consciousness, or if you wish to stop, close your eyes or look away and I’ll release you. Nod if you agree.”

John nodded once, slowly.

Sherlock smiled that alarming, I’m-a-sociopath grin that he had. “Excellent.”

And then he brought up his other hand to pinch John’s nose shut.

John squirmed, just a little, feeling awkward. This was weird, the whole thing was weird, and he was beginning to have second thoughts. Maybe he ought to call it off. If he just looked to the side, or closed his eyes—

But then Sherlock began talking.

“Don’t think. Don’t go into your head. Listen to me, focus on my voice. How does it feel? Fine for now, yes? You’re embarrassed, you’re _bored_. Enjoy it because that will change.”

Sherlock was right, as always. It was easy to hold his breath for now, John felt like he could do this for ages.

“By now your lungs should be starting to burn. Should I tell you what happens to the body as it runs out of oxygen? Right about now you should be feeling light headed.”

He was. His head was starting to feel fuzzy, his vision losing clarity at the edges. The burn in his chest was starting to edge towards real pain, and Sherlock kept talking. The clinical words felt almost like a caress.

“Carbon dioxin is building up in your blood and your brain is clamoring for oxygen. By now you should be feeling an overwhelming desire to breathe. You can gasp if you want, it won’t impede me any. It takes about three minutes for an average person to pass out from oxygen deprivation, although some people can make it as long as four. Should we try that? Do you want to see how long I can keep you hovering on the brink of unconsciousness?”

Oh, it was torture, and it was delicious.

He started to squirm again, though not from embarrassment this time but from genuine pain. He turned his head from side to side, trying to find a way to sneak some air past Sherlock’s palm, but his hands were big, and they remained firmly clamped over his mouth and nose. John panted against it, failing to do anything but strain against the vacuum Sherlock’s skin made against his lips.

Just as black spots were starting to swim in his vision, Sherlock took his hand away so John could gasp for breath.

“Two minutes and thirty seconds,” Sherlock said, and though he wasn’t looking at a watch, John had no doubt that his count was accurate. “Shall we do it again?”

John nodded. “God, yes,” he said, and his voice was hoarse.

Sherlock gripped John by his hair and pulled his head back to bare his throat, watching the expanse of it rise and fall as he took huge lungfuls of air, greedy for it.

“Interesting how desperately the body can crave something so simple as air. So simple it goes unnoticed most of the time... just until you can’t have it. And then you don’t want anything else so badly as you wish to breathe. Money, power, sex… none of them as all-consuming as the want for oxygen. Do you think you’ll struggle again?” Sherlock cocked his head to the side, and he’d switched tack so abruptly that it look John’s addled brain a second to catch up.

“Dunno,” he said, and licked his lips. “Probably.”

“Right.” Sherlock said, and shifted to straddle John, his knees planted to either side of his chest.

“Leverage,” he said in response to John’s cocked eyebrow.

They did it again, and Sherlock drew it out this time. He did as he’d said, keeping John just _there_ on the edge of consciousness. He drew his hand back every time it got to be too much, to let John take little sips of breath, but that was all he got— sips of air that left him aching and his chest burning.

It _hurt_ , and he did struggle. He thrashed, and Sherlock kept him expertly pinned with little nudges of his hips. He could feel Sherlock’s erection through the coarse fabric of his pants, and he choked out a moan at the thought of it. He kept his eyes on Sherlock the whole time, and it felt like those chilly eyes were boring into his soul.

It felt like they’d been there for hours, so long that John deliriously thought that he’d forgotten what it was like to breathe. His world was narrowed down to the points of contact where Sherlock’s skin touched his, to the tiny breaths that Sherlock allowed him to take.

That he couldn’t _breathe_ unless Sherlock allowed it—

It was maybe the single hottest thing that had ever happened to John in his life, and Sherlock was still fully clothed and barely touching him.

Sherlock ran his fingers through John’s hair which John belatedly realized was soaked with sweat.

“You’re close now. Your heart is pounding, skin is overheating. I could keep you like this all day, I think. I think you’d like it.” He ran his fingers down John’s body again, and John arched up into his hand. He was aching for it, he needed so badly to be touched.

“Oh, you are _flying_ on endorphins now, aren’t you? The body’s chemical solution to pain, euphoria brought on by hypoxia.” He ran a thumb over John’s cheek, and it came away wet. “Did you realize you were crying?” Sherlock smiled, a ghost of a thing. “No, I don’t think you did.”

Sherlock’s fingers ran down, down, through the thicket of curls at the top of John’s pelvis, but skirted away at the last moment so that John couldn’t get any friction where he really wanted it.

John grabbed onto Sherlock, hanging onto his shirt as though he was hanging on for dear life. “Sherlock, please.” He was begging. He was babbling. He’d left his dignity at the door somewhere, and nothing in John could bring himself to care.

“Hmm,” Sherlock hummed against the skin of his neck, and the vibrations against his throat made him gasp and moan and writhe. Sherlock nipped, then grazed his teeth over John’s collarbone, just hard enough to sting. “Please what?” he mouthed against the skin there.

“Touch me, Sherlock, _please_. Christ, please touch me. Make me come, let me come. Please, I need to—”

“Shhh,” Sherlock gentled, rubbing soothing strokes over John’s oversensitized skin. “Just once more,” he said, and he cut off John’s air again.

It _felt_ like drowning. Drowning in Sherlock’s eyes, in the indeterminate blue-grey of them. It felt like being utterly taken apart and laid bare, and as his vision started to go fuzzy at the edges and his chest started to ache, he rode the wave of it. And then all at once Sherlock’s hands were gone, and John gasped for breath, and then he couldn’t breathe because Sherlock’s mouth was on his, and Sherlock’s hand was on his cock, and he was coming harder than he ever had in his life.

It was biological—oxygen deprivation and the chemical cocktail of orgasm—but it felt like fireworks. Stars burst behind John’s eyes as he kissed desperately at Sherlock’s mouth with tongue and lips and so much teeth, before he had to break away for air.

As soon as he’d drawn some small measure of it into his lungs, he dove back in and recaptured Sherlock’s mouth, pressing messy, open-mouthed kisses into it, licking into corners of his lips and chasing his tongue. It turned languorous and lazy, but everything about that kiss was pure sex.

John let his head thump back against the pillow with a groan. “Oh my god.”

“So you said,” Sherlock smirked. “Many times.”

“Don’t make me wallop you with the pillow,” John threatened, but the effect was rather poor when he felt so boneless that he wasn’t even sure he could move for the next week.

He rolled on his side to look at Sherlock, who was now laying on the bed facing him, leaning on an elbow to prop his head up. This was the same Sherlock he knew, the one who dragged him to crime scenes where he made brilliant, impossible deductions. The one who ate too little and never did the washing up and left body parts and mold throughout the flat. The same one who’d just given him a mind-blowing orgasm and whispered the filthiest things in his ear.

How was it even possible that those people were one and the same? How was it possible that he had just done those things with _Sherlock_?

Sherlock groaned. “Oh, John. Please don’t start overthinking it _now_.”

“I just— what _was_ that?”

“I believe they call it sex.”

John rolled his eyes. “Thank you, captain obvious. I know we’re not all the mental equivalent of the great Sherlock Holmes, but I do know what sex is.”

At the mention of sex, John realized with a start that Sherlock hadn’t gotten off, not this time nor the last time. He’d been too blissed out in his own afterglow to realize that Sherlock must be uncomfortable.

Sherlock must have seen John glancing down at his pants because he said, quietly, “That’s not necessary.”

John ignored him and reached for him anyway. “Of course it’s necessary. I don’t know what you take me for, but I’m no slouch in bed… admittedly, all evidence to the contrary aside.”

Sherlock took John’s hands, though not ungently, and pulled them away from where they were fumbling with his belt. “I’m not accusing you of being a selfish lover. You should rest. What we just did was taxing on your body. It’s best if you lay quietly for some time, and some sleep might be in order.”

Sherlock enveloped John with his body and held him, as though to will him into sleep by pinning him still. Thanks to their height difference, Sherlock’s chin was resting atop John’s head, with John’s cheek pillowed in the curve of Sherlock’s neck. The expensive fabric of Sherlock’s shirt felt nice on John’s chest, and John inhaled deeply. He could smell Sherlock so clearly here, laundry detergent and sweat and right there in the hollow of Sherlock’s throat, that scent that was entirely him.

He sighed with a bone-deep contentment and felt his mind starting to drift towards sleep. All his bigger questions about _what is this_ and _why did you do this_ were seemingly no match for the deep animal exhaustion that pulled him towards the comforting oblivion of slumber.

A thought occurred to him then— something Sherlock had said the other day. Was he saying it wasn’t necessary because he wasn’t turned on by this at all? Sherlock’s body was pressed up against him like an overlarge cat, but his hips were carefully tilted away and out of reach.

“You’re thinking too hard again,” Sherlock murmured, and John could feel the vibrations from his larynx as he spoke.

John pulled back so he could look at Sherlock, whose hands reluctantly slipped from where they had been holding John to let him go.

“What you said the other day,” John said, “About how you didn’t like it the way I thought. The...  sink stuff.”

“Erotic asphyxiation, John. You can call it what it is, the words won’t bite you.”

“Fine, erotic asphyxiation. What did you mean by that? Did you— do you not—?” John trailed off, looking to Sherlock and hoping he’d understand the question he was trying to ask without having to say it.

Sherlock shrugged with the shoulder not currently pressed against the mattress, and how was it that he could make even such a careless gesture look graceful? “You like this game. It excites you, it turns you on. You like staring death in the face, but you wouldn’t trust most people to strangle you, to drown you, to take you right up to the edge and hold you over—quite right, by the way. Most people are idiots who shouldn’t even be trusted to heat up a tv dinner. It’s amazing they don’t kill themselves going about their daily lives—” He cut himself off. “Who better to give you what you like than a sociopath? Who else could take it that far?”

Well. That was. That was quite a lot to take in. Was it true? Was he the kind of twisted that got off on defying death? He supposed he might just be. But more to the point—

“You don’t like it?” John asked.

“Not as such. I enjoy watching you. The expressions on your face, the sounds you make… it’s intoxicating. The rest of it, well. I don’t mind it. Not at all.”

That confession made John feel warm in an entirely different way. Knowing that Sherlock got off not on the game they’d been playing, but on _him_ . That was just like standing at the edge of a cliff, and Sherlock was right. He _did_ like it. It was exhilarating. He loved butting up against the precipice of a very great fall and urging himself to do it. To jump.

He jumped.

“You were wrong about one thing,” John said.

“Oh?”

“It’s not that I don’t trust anyone else to do this to me. It’s that I don’t _want_ anyone else to do it. No one but you.”

Sherlock’s brows knit together. “Well of course you don’t want anyone else to do it, up until an hour ago you didn’t even know you enjoyed it. You’ve hardly had the time to—”

“Shut up, you idiot. I’m trying to tell you I love you.”

Sherlock’s mouth snapped shut with an almost audible click, and John had the distinct satisfaction of knowing that he rendered the great detective speechless.

“Oh. _Oh_.”

He could see the gears beginning to turn in Sherlock’s head, and he preempted it by pushing forward and catching Sherlock’s mouth in another kiss. He slid an arm behind Sherlock and cupped the back of his head, tilting it for better access to his mouth. He went slow this time, like a proper first kiss. He ran his tongue over Sherlock’s lip, teasing. After a moment, Sherlock seemed to come to whatever conclusion he needed to reach, and then he was kissing back.

This kiss was sweet, slow and unhurried. John nipped at Sherlock’s lip, pulled away and came back to kiss him again. He tangled his hand in the lush, thick curls of Sherlock’s head, thrilling in the simple joy of being allowed to touch.

When they finally broke apart at last, they were both breathing hard, and if John had been uncertain of Sherlock’s being turned on before, he was left with no doubt now. The hard length of Sherlock’s erection was pressing into John’s thigh, and the thought of _that_ made his cock try gamely to rise to the occasion again.

“You were wrong about one other thing,” John said, sliding his hand down to cup Sherlock through his pants.

Sherlock raised an eyebrow. “And what might that be?” The effect of his arch intonation was utterly wrecked by the hitch in his breath and the red stain across those high, otherworldly cheekbones.

“This is _absolutely_ necessary,” John said as he managed to get Sherlock’s belt open and his pants shoved low over his hips.

“John—” Sherlock started, but John shushed him with another kiss.

“Nothing strenuous, yeah? And which one of us is the doctor?”

Sherlock grumbled something about improper bedside manner, but it was lost to a sudden gasp as John wrapped his hand around Sherlock’s cock and started to stroke him.

“ _John_ ,” he choked out again. “John, John, John.”

His name chanted in Sherlock’s voice, grown breathy with pleasure, was a revelation. He nipped at Sherlock’s neck, sucking bruises into his skin as Sherlock’s hands twisted in the bed sheets and held on for dear life.

“Christ, yes.” John murmured into his skin, pulling back to watch the delicate play of emotions over Sherlock’s face, his eyes screwed shut and mouth falling open in pleasure. “God, you are beautiful like this.”

Sherlock came on a choked-off gasp, sounding almost startled.

John pressed a final kiss to the corner of his mouth, wiped his hand on the sheets, and fell back against the pillow with a contented sigh. He was still wiped out from his own mind-blowing orgasm earlier, and Sherlock was right: his body felt tired and abused. He was not a young man anymore.

He got the prickly, hair-standing-up-on-the-back-of-your-neck sensation of someone watching him and shifted a little to crack an eye open in Sherlocks’ direction.

“You said you loved me,” Sherlock said.

“That I did,” John agreed, feeling entirely too indulgently sated and sleepy to worry about the implications of it, to worry about anything at all.

“That’s—” Sherlock smiled, mouth quirking up at the corner. “That’s good.”

He pulled John into his arms and wrapped a leg around him. His pants were still awkwardly shoved around his hips, they were both sticky, and John felt gross with stale sweat.

It was perfect.

“You’re like some kind of long-limbed octopus,” John groused.

Sherlock chuckled low in his throat, and John could feel the vibrations spreading throughout his back where it was pressed to Sherlock’s chest.

The light from outside was filtering into the room in shades of twilight now. The dying rays of the sun painted everything in a warm golden glow. They were quiet for so long that John started drifting off to sleep, the day and the case and everything else finally catching up to him.

“John?”

“Mm.”

“I love you too.”

John huffed a laugh. “Well I should hope so.” But he tilted his head up to press a kiss to Sherlock’s chin before he fell asleep at last.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can check out my [original writing here](https://hopezane.com) if you're interested.
> 
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